Tony Fish, 7th February 2018

Tony is perhaps best known for his work with Pink Floyd, Paul McCartney, Manfred Mann, Bob Godfrey and Suzie Templeton. He edited the concert film sequences for Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here and The Wall world tours and the animated sections of the Pink Floyd – The Wall feature film. He also edited the Gunner’s Dream film sequence for Roger Waters’ The Pros And Cons Of Hitchhiking tour. He enjoyed a decades-long collaboration with Bob Godfrey (most notably on his Oscar-winning film Great and the series Roobarb And Custard) and more recently he edited Suzie Templeton’s Oscar and multi-award-winning Peter And The Wolf.

Tony discussed his remarkable life and career and described how its course was steered by several key experiences; for example, whilst enjoying a short career building boats, he saw the animated film The Rise And Fall Of Emily Sprod (1962), directed by Bob Godfrey and edited by Peter Hearne, at his local film club. The image of a train emerging from the mouth of an opera singer afixed itself to his mind’s eye and engendered in him a lifelong love of animation. This in turn led, many years later, to a chance meeting with the film’s director on Oxford Street, who offered Tony his first job as editor while he balanced a giant pile of film cans on his head.

Biography
Tony studied photography and film at Bournemouth and Poole College Of Art. His graduation film DAI SUE BECCA (Live Action) was selected by the British Film Institute as support film in the Italian season at the National Film Theatre in 1967. He entered the industry as runner/assistant editor and in 1966 joined the legendary Bob Godfrey in Wardour Street. The studio worked on projects for Barry Humphries, Gerald Scarfe, Roman Polanski, John and Yoko and many others. In 1972 Tony became a freelance editor and formed Picturehead Productions with Peter Hearn in 1979. Peter then left Picturehead in 1993.

Tony’s editing work has covered animation, live-action, commercials, TV and documentaries. He is currently visiting tutor at the Royal College of Art and in 2009 he received a Lifetime Achievement Award from The National Media Museum at the 16th Bradford Animation Festival.